Bella Hadid has revealed why she has returned to Victoria's Secret as it attempts to rebrand as the VS Collective.
Over the past few years the firm was swamped with controversies including a raft of sexual misconduct claims such as that Bella was harassed.
'What magnetized me to coming back was them coming to me and really proving to me that, behind the scenes, Victoria's Secret has changed so drastically,' the 25-year-old insisted in a new interview with Marie Claire.
'Victoria's Secret has changed so drastically': Bella Hadid has revealed why she has returned to Victoria's Secret as it attempts to rebrand as the VS Collective; pictured in September
'There was a type of way that, I think, a lot of us women who used to work with Victoria's Secret felt. And now, six of the seven [VS] board members are all female. And there's new photoshoot protocols that we have. So a lot has changed.'
A couple of years ago Bella intimated that she 'never felt powerful' during the three runway shows she walked for Victoria's Secret.
She said that Rihanna's Savage X Fenty show in September 2019 'was the first time on a runway that I felt really sexy,' according to Women's Wear Daily.
When Marie Claire brought up those remarks to Bella she responded that becoming part of the VS Collective 'was really about taking my power back and having the power over my body be released to myself again.'
Throwback: Early in her career Bella walked the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show for its final three years including the last one in 2018 in New York City
She said: 'I think the beauty of what Victoria's Secret is as a collective is about the conversation. All of us together, Paloma [Elsesser], Adut [Akech], when we sit on set, we're just grateful for how we feel supported now, instead of how we used to feel, when it was a lingerie company that used to be run by men for men.'
Bella added: 'I just look around [on set] and I feel empowered again. I feel empowered in lingerie, instead of feeling like my body is some sort of money maker.'
The little sister of Gigi Hadid confessed: 'It took me almost a year and a half to take the meeting with them. Even having that conversation was very complicated for me because of the way that I had felt in the past.'
However she came around over the course of 'multiple meetings' where the brand was 'able to prove to me' that certain 'protocols' were put in place.
Origin story: The first Victoria's Secret Fashion Show she walked was the 2016 extravaganza held at the Grand Palais in Paris
'They have in our contracts that - which we, by the way, don't have anywhere else. Not in editorial [shoots], not any other fashion shoots, so it's incredible to see that a lingerie company had even thought about this - we don't have to do anything, basically, that we don't want to do,' she said.
'We don't need to show parts of our body that we don't want to show. That's really important for us as women, because sometimes, going into these sets, we do lose our boundaries. And our boundaries are not accepted.'
Bella maintained that 'I know firsthand how Victoria's Secret used to make me feel, and now, going onto set every day, there is just an energy that's switched.'
